


Five Beetles Booster Found in Alternate Universes

by bliumchik



Series: Justice Angels AU [2]
Category: DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Alternate Reality, Alternate Universe, Angst, Angsty Schmoop, Lols, M/M, Schmoop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-15
Updated: 2007-12-15
Packaged: 2017-10-26 02:44:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/277795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bliumchik/pseuds/bliumchik
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Does what it says on the tin. (Standalone fic)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Beetles Booster Found in Alternate Universes

**Author's Note:**

> Five AUs. One of them is in the 'verse of the series I've tagged this with, the others obviously are not. See if you can guess which one!

**  
1\. The one where friendship is magic.   
**

“Booster, old chum, I’m seeing double!”

“Holy doppelgangers, Ted!”

“Murgh?” asked Booster, waiting for his vision to clear. When it did, he almost wished it hadn’t. He was being peered at by himself, somewhat sparklier than usual, and a very lively Beetle apparently wearing a costume made out of a baby blanket – Booster reached out and poked him. Bizarrely, it really was fuzzy as well as pastel. There were cute little beetles stitched into it.

“…the hell?”

“Hello, Booster!” Exclaimed his double. “I’m Booster. Very pleased to meet you!”

“I don’t remember building a clone or a robot…” Beetle mused. “I say, are you an evil twin or just from a different universe?”

“Um. The second one.” Booster said weakly. 

“Oh, this is so exciting!” Glitter-Booster cried. “We must show him to the rest of the League!”

“Absolutely!” Said the other Ted, grinning. “Come on!”

With that Booster found himself dragged through the hallways of the Watchtower (redecorated in… well, mostly pink. Booster shuddered. There were _pony stencils_ ), with the other Blue Beetle and Booster Gold holding on to one of his wrists each and… skipping?

Then they entered the monitor room and all of Booster’s hair stood on end in a highly creepy fashion, possibly due to a force field malfunction but probably because Batman and Superman were holding hands.

 

 **  
2\. The one with the giant robots.   
**

“Muahahahahaha!” Cried the Blue Beetle triumphantly. “Soon my plan will be complete! And then I shall rule all! Throw the switch, Gold!”

“Yes boss,” said the man Booster was currently mentally referring to as Stormtrooper Gold (death rays sold separately!), and started for the control platform. Booster trailed along helplessly behind him.

“Gold! How many times have I told you not to call me boss?”

“Right bo- I mean, great general,” said Gold, and threw the switch. “World Domination Matrix is go, your mighty, uh, ness.”

Beetle giggled manically and twirled his cape. Also his moustaches.

“What I want to know,” Booster said to his double, who was now busy ogling the slave girls, “Is why you’re the henchman. Surely I have the brains to be a co-conspirator? A trusted advisor, at least?”

“Gold!” snapped Evil Beetle. “I want a latte! Take your wimpy twin and requisition a Starbucks.”

“Most of them are sort of rubble by now, oh powerful and extremely clever one.” Gold replied, nudging Booster to point out a particularly fetching chain mail bikini.  


“Then we shall invade Brazil!” Beetle said imperiously, striking a pose.  


“Yes boss,” sighed both Boosters.

 

 **  
3\. The one filmed by Ridley Scott.   
**

“Booster? Oh god. Oh god, Booster.” 

Ted had his arms around Booster in a vice-like grip. His goggles hung around his neck, digging into Booster’s chest. They were in a fairly impressive laboratory – something was off but at least Ted wasn’t _fluffy_. He was, however, doing a terrifyingly good impression of a limpet. He was… he was _shaking_.

“T-Ted?” Booster said uncertainly, hugging him back.

“It’s you. It’s really you. You’re not dead. How…?” Ted pulled back and stared at him. “I… you can’t be alive. I _saw_ you- …your uniform. It’s different.”

“I’m just visiting. I’m from another universe.” Booster smiled in what he hoped was a reassuring manner. “Wait, I’m dead here? Not, not evil, or shiny? Er. Shinier.” He added.

“Interdimensional travel? Really?” Blue Beetle’s scientific curiosity was clearly beginning to overcome his shock. He started pacing the floor of the lab, and Booster realised what had been bothering him since he’d stepped through the portal.

“Why is there a giant cross on your costume? And how did I _die_?” Booster asked.

“The theory is sound…” Ted mused.

“Okay, nevermind.” Booster muttered. “There are no giant robots, no _glitter_ but it looks like we’re on the Watchtower again, I’ll go find out from someone else-“

He started towards the door. This jogged Beetle from his scientific reverie and he leaped between Booster and the door.

“No! No, don’t, please, trust me, you can’t leave the lab. God, Booster. What… why are you here? How did you get here? What am I like in… in your universe?”

“You’re…” Booster hesitated.

“Oh.” Ted murmured. “Of course. Symmetry. I’m dead, aren’t I? They got me instead of you. Or I must have-“

“No, wait a second, Ted - who’s they? OMAC? What happened?”

“O…?” Ted frowned in confusion. “There’s nothing by that name here. You- I mean, my Booster. He was just… indiscreet.” Ted looked away. 

“Indiscreet?”

“ _You_ know. You sound just like him, although apparently with more good sense if you didn’t get yourself arrested as a heretic.”

“What!?” Booster stared.

“He was all, in the future the church doesn’t tell you who you can and can’t love, in the future priests don’t torture people, in the future God is some sort of quantum state… dammit, Michael, it’s a wonder they didn’t kill you earlier!”

Ted was clearly working himself up into hysterics again, but Booster was paralysed in shock. They were on the _Watchtower_ , for- crying out loud, they were superheroes – how could they let some kind of modern _Spanish_ _Inquisition_ \- he started for the door again.

“There is no way Superman would stand for something like that, what the hell is going-”

Suddenly his arms were full of Beetle again, babbling, practically sobbing out _don’t you leave me again don’t die again you can’t you can’t you can’t leave he’ll hear you please, Booster, Booster, please._

“Ted-“ He said helplessly, dropping them both down to the floor and holding him tightly, trying to calm him, stop him from shivering like a trauma case. “Ted, listen. It’s okay, I’m not leaving the lab, I’m here, I’ll wait, it’s okay. Who’ll hear me, Ted? Why can’t I leave?”

“The lab. It’s soundproof.” Ted muttered through gritted teeth, forehead pressed hard into Booster’s shoulder. “I managed to get permission by constantly building them weapons that make high-pitched noises in testing, he finally got annoyed by them, and I’m, ha, I’m harmless, I’m totally loyal, I- Booster the things I’ve done-“

“Focus, Ted!” Booster said hastily, gripping his shoulders, because Ted was starting to tear up again and he looked so much like the Blue Beetle he’d lost, he couldn’t stand it. “Who is it? Who’s going to hear me if I leave the lab?”

“The Angel.” Ted whispered, shaking. “The Angel of Metropolis.”

 

 **  
4\. The one with Jetpack Hitler? Fruit? Tobogganing? No superpowers? Pirates? The Matrix? An alien invasion? Vampires? Global warming? A trip to the zoo?   
**

“I’m actually finding my female self disturbingly hot,” mused Booster. The portal behind him hummed ominously and started throwing up sparks. He jumped and cannon boomed as Ted threw the zeppelin into evasive manoeuvres and -shift- “I AM LEGION,” boomed Skeets, “RESISTANCE IS F-” -shift- “It’s the moon,” whispered Beetle, and bared his teeth -shift- Max Lord laughed, “En garde!” grin flashing bright like the blade of his -shift- Ted appeared, disappeared, turned lime green was a fish tapped the blackboard and said “Mister Carter, complete this equation,” exploded imploded threw darts at a mirror it cracked and he tumbled through infinite blue-

 _  
“Hold on, Booster,” said Ted in a million voices. “I think I know what’s wr-”   
_

-shift- “Arr, avast!” cried Captain Gold, and Booster struggled not to laugh because First Mate Kord had a pistol on him and there was a _plank_ -shift- the small green man nodded and said “We would like to observe the human ritual of-” -shift- “And your little robot, too!” Max said with glee, and Beetle tried on the red boots -shift- “I’m starting to think my universe isn’t so bad after all,” muttered Booster as Ted introduced him to someone called Neo -shift- “Go back where you came from,” hissed Batman, all bloody -shift- flowers and flowers and flowers and somewhere the green lady laughed and laughed -shift- “Plead not guilty,” Beetle whispered urgently. “I have a plan!” -shift- “I have _such_ a headache,” he moaned-

 _  
“Got it!” buzzed Ted(s), “Now stop messing around with-”   
_

 

 **  
5\. The one where it was just right.   
**

Booster rubbed his forehead. Something in his recent memory was waving a flag, but he couldn’t… everything was so _blurry_. He shook his head and moved on. This reality seemed fairly similar to his own – there were the usual subtle differences in geography, that building had been destroyed by a supervillain a few years back, that one was normally a few blocks over, that park hadn’t had a playground. He was almost certain he’d seen an ad for Valentine’s Day in a chocolate store featuring two women… He’d been on the lookout for newspapers and TV shops on the way, maybe get a warning this time of whatever the hell was wrong with this universe, but here he was outside Ted’s house and he still had no clue what he was up against.

Peeking through a crack in Beetle’s curtains, it took a moment for the scene to resolve itself in his brain. But, yep, that was definitely Ted’s bedroom, and that was most certainly Ted in the arms of- Booster blinked bemusedly at yet another version of himself.

The alternate Booster was wrapped around this universe’s Blue Beetle like another blanket, occasionally pressing sleepy kisses to the other man’s shoulder. Ted shifted a little as he woke up, arching his back, and rolled over to face the other Booster, touching his face as though he were a fragile thing, or a particularly fascinating piece of alien technology. The other Booster murmured something that made Ted smirk and change the touch to something more purposeful, tracing the curve of the other Booster’s jaw and tangling in his hair. Then Ted pushed the other Booster onto his back, still wearing that prankster grin, and-

Booster turned away from the window, wiping his face. Maybe it was time to go home.


End file.
